Bell, Telus and other phone companies must pay back about $310 million to urban customers in the culmination of a bitter dispute with consumer groups that has lasted years, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission has ruled.

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) today directed the large telephone companies to rebate $310.8 million to their urban home telephone customers. At the same time, the CRTC has approved a plan for the deployment of broadband Internet service to 287 rural and remote communities.

Interesting that all of this "pro-consumer" stuff from the CRTC comes out only a few weeks after we hear the entire CRTC may get a bit of a shakeup and reduced power (or potentially dissolved completely). Especially given the recent string of almost preposterous rulings for the big corps.

If Harper moves against CRTC; and does what I forsee as something positive against them - that alone will get them my vote next election.

1 move compared to many terrible ones (just today I read about dissolving the prison farm program) will not get my vote for him.

But in relation to the article, I too agree that the CRTC may be just trying to save some of their ass from getting grilled. I am quite frankly surprised any motion has been made against the CRTC.. So this is at least a step in the right direction.

EDIT: To fixT's response below (don't want to thread crap since this is unrelated): A large amount of food for the prison comes from the farm. Instead this will have to be purchased now. It was claimed cutting back the farm system could save "millions." Yes, the media blows things out of proportion but this still sounds like a stretch. It was also probably a better use of the inmates time than a lot of other things. I think it is more an attempt to keep the soon-to-be free people from farming themselves, since the government consistently takes step after step to make it more difficult and expensive for private farmers to succeed. That is a whole different matter though.. and not meant to stifle what is a victory for big phone company subscribers.

1 move compared to many terrible ones (just today I read about dissolving the prison farm program) will not get my vote for him.
.

In a time when costs and budgets need to be trimmed and cut in order to not go further into debt, reducing the number of services and "extras", including a tax payer paid for hobby farm for federal inmate seems like an appropriate cut back to me. It seems like a far better option than being forced to reduce spending on correctional officers, security and protection within the prison systems or academic & trade education programs or other rehabilitation programs that can have a greater affect on more inmates.

The media blows this so out of proportion and definitely doesn't report all the facts.

Not trying to devalue the effect of the farms, but in all honesty, the whole excuse that "this will rehabilitate offenders" is just a guise. These farms were only used by minimum security prisons. Minimum security prisons are for offenders already rehabilitated and who are already making the transition back into society. Or they are white collar criminals who are no/low risk offenders and no risk of escape and in general don't need rehabilitation.

Heck, people PAY to take vacations like these inmates are having. The millions they save need to be reassigned back into the correctional system to attempt to decrease repeat offenders and rehabilitate those who actually may stand to benefit from it, not pay for a farm trip with taxpayer dollars.

But this isn't really the time or place for a political discussion - sorry I tend to get a bit opinionated on criminal justice issues

^^
I agree with this. It's always funny to watch the CBC and see how they find every nook and canny to bash the Conservatives while showing minimal exposure of scandals (with regards to the most recent set within the last few years) set by the Liberals. Might have to do with the funding cut, but then again, the CBC has always been biased to the left wing.

This rebate will be pointless if they increase costs for their services anyway.

I'd rather them be forced to put that money back into the infrastructure. More people need high speed internet instead of dialup.

That is what I would prefer as well. I know I have good speeds (even faster in a couple days) but I hate how I can send my parents anything because all they have is satellite, which is a rip off. It is really frustrating as Telus has fiber part way down their road but will not bring it the 1/2 km to the rest of the people living there.

I would much prefer more people have decent access to broadband than for me to get what 25-90 off of a bill.

Oh and one thing I read that ticked me off and reminded me why I will not deal will Bell.

Quote:

The CRTC rejected Bell's suggestion that the rural rollout be done using HSPA wireless technology, with a monthly usage limit of two gigabytes.

And then Bell's response,

Quote:

"It's unfortunate that the CRTC has denied customers in these rural and remote communities access to the latest broadband network technology and advanced services," she said.

I like how Bell thinks the two gigabytes a month is good. I'm sure they just want everyone to be on cellphone data plans.

__________________

"Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong."